


in the dark with our demons

by elegantstupidity



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Blood, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Future Fic, Nightmares
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-27
Updated: 2016-04-27
Packaged: 2018-06-03 18:04:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6620812
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elegantstupidity/pseuds/elegantstupidity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bellamy can't sleep. Clarke can't sleep. Too bad they're mostly avoiding each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	in the dark with our demons

**Author's Note:**

  * For [officalchacha15.tumblr.com](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=officalchacha15.tumblr.com).



> I decided to meld two prompts because why wouldn't I? So what I got was: 1) someone has a bad dream and the other soothes them back to bed and, 2) They're fighting then suddenly they start making out. No matter how angsty it seems, know that we'll get there in the end!
> 
> Also, I would describe this as canon-tangential. Canon-adjacent? Either way, I don't care that much about a lot of canon events. There aren't many specifics involved aside from being s3 and still in Arkadia. And Lincoln is alive. 
> 
> title from "I Have Made Mistakes" by the Oh Hellos

_He’s running. He’s been running since he hit the ground, of course this isn't any different. Branches rip at his clothes and and snarl in his hair and rake at his skin as he tears through the woods. Woods that should be familiar by now, but are as foreign as the first day he set foot in them._

_Flames lick at his heels. Blood drips from shallow scrapes and sizzles when it falls to the scorched earth._

_Everything is awash in red and shadow. Mount Weather’s klaxon wails through the burning forest and Bellamy can’t find his bearings. Desperately, he whirls, searching for something familiar. Every time he spins, there’s more red._

_Red dress on a faceless woman._

_Red noose tightening around his neck._

_Red fire (so much fire)._

_Red eyes glare balefully from his sister’s, Miller’s, Lincoln’s face._

_Red blood seeps into his boots and up his legs to become reaching, grasping, clawing hands, hungry and frenzied, determined to pull him into the depths of the earth itself._

_He’s chest deep in the viscera and calling out to his people, to_ anyone, _for help. He can see them, his delinquents, just beyond his reach. But one by one, they turn away, faces cold with indifference even as the flames flicker across them. He screams himself hoarse even as he doesn’t blame them, sinking down, down down until his only sky is red and he can’t breathe, he can’t—_

Bellamy rockets upright in bed, wheezing with terror and adrenaline. For a moment, all he can process is an urge to  _runrunrunrun._  He checks it, forces himself to lie still and focus on choking down labored snatches of air.As he breathes, the frenetic panic subsides into its usual background thrum. Constant, but possible to suppress. A hand scrubs over his face and into his sweat-damp hair. He focuses on the steady expansion of his lungs until the thing he calls calm settles in. Still, every breath he takes and it feels like the metal walls bow in to encroach on his space, intent on crushing him where he sits.

( _Runrunrunrun_ still ticks along somewhere in the back of his mind.)

His temples throb and it takes every ounce of willpower not to just close his eyes and sink back into the nightmare. All he wants is to sleep. Ideally, sleep uninterrupted by guilt-fueled nightmares.

He knows from experience, though, that’s not going to happen tonight. The tense, disturbed rest he might get isn’t worth the price of admission.

So, he rolls out of bed, resigned to another sleepless night.

Within minutes, he’s got his boots and jacket on and he creeps through the nearly silent halls of the Ark. Sure, he’d never had much reason to wander Alpha Station when it was in orbit, but he’s had plenty of opportunity on the ground. Weeks of nightmare-induced insomnia will do that for a man. In the oppressive darkness, Bellamy makes his way to a mostly overlooked exit, trying hard not to react and jump at every shadow. 

As uncaring and brutal as Earth can be, he sighs at the first brush of breeze against his clammy skin. With his eyes closed, it’s almost possible to believe that the ground is everything he once dreamed. Verdant grass and crisp, fresh water. An endless sky stretching above him rather than closing in around a flimsy, metal shell.

He can’t live with his eyes closed, though. 

He can't handicap himself like that, leave himself and everyone else vulnerable to the dangers of Earth. No, better to live knowing exactly what's coming for him. Harder, but better all the same.

Eyes closed and it's easier for memories and guilt to catch up to him, too. (Not that the guilt needs the help.) Octavia’s iciness, Lincoln's distrust, Harper’s reserve, Miller’s hesitance, Monty’s uncertainty: they all haunt his every step. 

And of course: Clarke’s distance.

Dismantling a genocidal AI had done most of the work in repairing Bellamy’s relationships with his sister and friends. From experience, saving the world leaves very little room to question anyone offering help. Whether or not that is a good thing is always left to chance. (When he lets himself think of Lexa and Pike and Finn, regret creeps ever closer.) Time and talking and building trust had done the rest. 

Most of the rest. 

Leave out the fact that he still doesn’t trust himself the way he once did, can't bring himself to volunteer for the guard roster again, but he and Clarke are warier around each other than they’ve ever been. Even in those first days on earth, they’d been brash and competitive, in each other’s faces more often than not. Always pushing buttons and pressing advantages. He’d had this constant awareness of Clarke. More than any delinquent aside from Octavia. 

Maybe it was because he’d always been aware of Clarke, princess in space. She was a beacon of everything that was wrong with the Ark, of course she would stay that way on the ground. 

For a while, though, he’d been sure it was something more. 

Now, he hardly even sees her. She's always gone by the time he thinks he's managed to track her down. Sometimes, she'll speak to him when someone else is around, but the way she stares over his shoulder and itches to get away always has him cutting those conversations short. Bellamy tries not to let her aversion to him hurt, but it's hard not to think about the easiness they'd once had. They’d understood each other, almost without wanting to.

He tells himself that and that alone is why it’s strange to feel so cut off from her. 

He also tells himself that it's all right if she hates him, he'd understand. 

(It's less clear whether or not he's fooling himself. Not the understanding, but that he'd be all right.)

When she left, he’d told himself that she’d come back (he had to believe she would come back) and she has. But in the ways that matter, she feels further away than ever. 

(In space, when he'd been hiding his mother's secret and she was the golden girl, Factory and Alpha might as well have been lightyears apart. They're equals now, have been since before they agreed to make the decisions. Maybe that's why the distance feels so excruciating. Which is ridiculous, he knows. He shouldn’t feel so lost without this girl that he’s known less than a year.)

Maybe he’s just lost. With or without Clarke, maybe he’s made too many bad decisions and wandered irrevocably from the path he was meant to walk.

This isn’t such a strange train of thought for his nightly wanderings. (He's got a lot of time on his hands, of course his regrets and fears come up. It's not as if it's an abundance of good dreams that keeps him up at night.) It’s not even a particularly harsh one. He makes his way to Raven’s Gate automatically, avoiding guards with the ease of practice. 

It’s not until he’s rounded the debris that shields this spot from prying eyes and first made it so useful that Bellamy pulls himself out of his dark thoughts.

Because the reason for some of those thoughts is suddenly in front of him. 

“Clarke?”

She’s huddled on the ground, almost exactly where Bellamy usually settles on nights when the nightmares drive him from his room. Her head, tilted back against the metal wall, tips to the side so she can peer up at him. There’s something raw and sharp about Clarke in the darkest hours before morning—she becomes an exposed, frayed wire of a girl, and tonight is no different. Bellamy recognizes the sluggish panic in her eyes from every glimpse of his reflection he’s caught in recent memory.

At the sight of him, she curls in on herself, but still breathes out, “Hey, Bellamy,” like nothing’s wrong. Like the sight of him doesn’t make her throat close and stomach heave. Like she hasn't been avoiding him with single-minded intensity for months now.

Awkwardly, Bellamy hovers. He wants to be alone, but Clarke looks so tired and miserable, and he can’t just leave her here. No matter what she thinks of him.

So, when Clarke pats the ground next to her, of course Bellamy drops into place. 

“Rough night?” he finally asks, chafing at the silence.

The sound that burbles from Clarke’s mouth could generously be called a laugh. But it’s choked off, like she's just remembered that she’s not allowed to laugh anymore. 

“No more than usual,” she rasps, pointedly gazing out into the night.

He sighs and settles back against the wall of debris. When she lets the silence lapse again and doesn’t say anything after ten minutes, he shifts to get up in search of solitude. He can stew in silence on his own, he doesn't need to do it in front of Clarke.

That seems to shake her into action. Her hand rockets out to clutch at his sleeve and her gaze pins him down.

“You’re leaving?” He can't quite read the tone in her voice, but he's gotten used to not understanding her lately.

Bellamy fights back a snort and gives her a look. Now she wants his company? She flushes a little, but doesn’t let go. 

“Yeah, Clarke. I’m going to go inside.” Not true, but she'll probably let him go for that. 

“You can’t!” she blurts anyway, fingers flexing convulsively. His brain sticks on the feeling. He's never held Clarke's hand, not really, but it seems like they're always ending up in these close calls. Still, her fingers wrapped around his arm and a command aren't enough for him.

If he’d had any more sleep in the past weeks, maybe he would have bit back the words. But, “Pretty sure you don’t get a say anymore,” tumbles out nonetheless. Sometimes it's easy to forget his anger in the face of all the guilt, but it's always there, smoldering through his stomach. Even angry, h e can't stand to watch the way Clarke flinches away, so he levers himself off the ground and retreats into the night. He'll give her the space she wants.

Or, he would if Clarke could just leave well enough alone. 

Not even a minute goes by and Bellamy's jerked around, Clarke's fingers wrapped around his wrist. 

"What the hell, Bellamy?" She's furious, blazing in a way they haven't since those first days on Earth. 

He's exhausted and tired of dancing around Clarke, waiting for her to give some indication of what she's feeling. If she hates him, he'd rather know. "What do you want from me, Clarke?" And that's the real question. Clarke might be back and living with them, but he's never been less certain about what she  _wants_. She's always done what needs doing, but Bellamy has come to realize that maybe he doesn't know her the way he thought he did. 

"I want you to tell me where that came from!" she demands. 

He seethes at her willful obliviousness. Clarke is one of the smartest people he's ever met. There's no way she's surprised by his attitude. She can't leave him to fend for himself and then demand to know why he's become less concerned with her opinion. "You know where it came from. What do you actually want from me?" he snarls.

That shocks her enough to send her rocking away from him. Not that she lets it faze her long. She grounds herself again and leans in, earnest. "I want us to be like we were," she admits, eyes wide and for once looking _at_ him.

"We can't. What's to go back to anyway?" he demands roughly, letting his frustration boil over. "Back to the dropship when we hated and undermined each other? Back to the Mountain? Back to those three months when I wasn't sure if I'd ever see you alive again?" 

It's unfair. Which she points out. Because they did work at one point. And worked well. But a few weeks of partnership can't override the months of uncertainty and fear and aching that came when Clarke left. 

"I had to go, Bellamy," she continues, using that same explanation, the only explanation he's ever gotten. 

"That's not good enough anymore!" he nearly shouts, voice echoing off the remnants of Alpha Station. He swallows and tries to rein in his temper. "I know you had to leave, Clarke, but you won't tell me why." 

"I just had — "

He scoffs. "Come on. If you aren't going to tell me, just say so. If I don't matter to you anymore, tell me. You say you want to go back to how things were? What's the point in even trying if you're not going to talk to me? You don't trust me, Clarke, and I don't know how to fix that."

She clenches her jaw, hurt and struggling not to show it. "If that's how you feel," she bites out stiffly, but Bellamy cuts her off.  


"It doesn't matter how I feel!" he rages. How can she not understand? He takes a step closer to her and he would swear she checks herself from flinching away. If he weren't so frustrated, he would back up immediately, apologize, and leave her be. But this argument has been ages in the making, and he really doesn't want to return to a life where he has to keep orbiting around Clarke and her need for space. He's going to push her for answers. "What matters is that it feels like you're still gone for all I see you. What matters is how _you_ feel!"

"How I feel?" she exclaims and barrels on, "I'm just starting to feel like a person again! Everyone thinks I left because I  _wanted_ to be alone, but I just didn't know how not to be. The first time I ever had to deal with real pain, my father was floated and I was locked into solitary confinement for nearly a year. I learned to deal with my grief the only way I could: alone. And that had nothing on what Mount Weather did to me. All those lives we took? They hollowed me out and me melting down in camp because I couldn't remember what being a human felt like wouldn't have helped anyone. I needed space and time to put myself back together and I thought that maybe you understood that."

"You aren't the only one to feel inhuman, you know," he bites out. How can she think that she has a monopoly on the guilt of Mount Weather? That it affected her more than anyone else?

"I know it was selfish to leave you with that weight, and I'm sorry that I had to. But I wanted to give you the space that I got to have."

"I didn't want space, Clarke. I wanted support from my friends. And it isn't your job to decide what I get!" 

"I'm sorry, okay! I just felt like I shouldn't help you. I make things so much worse, all the time, I couldn't do that to you, too."

"You don't make things worse."  


"I do! Why would anyone want me around when I—"

Maybe it’s because he’s exhausted, hasn’t slept a night through in what feels like weeks, and the adrenaline from his nightmare has only been fueled by this argument. Maybe he can't stand to hear Clarke talk about herself like this, like she can't recognize her importance. (Mad as he is, he would never say Clarke Griffin isn't important.) 

Or maybe it’s because he’s wanted _this_ for god knows how long, probably since he’d first found himself in a bunker with a princess and a gun, but he cuts Clarke off with a kiss. 

The way old earth novels made it sound (he’d spent months of his life reading Octavia every awful romance in the Ark’s digital archives because she could never sit still long enough to read them herself), Bellamy feels like the moment should be more explosive, more passionate, more earth-shattering. Those stories described kisses like this as contests of will, battles to be won. But Clarke and Bellamy have seen more than their fair share of war for it to hold anything other than horror. This is infinitely better, proof that they can still come together in something good. It's tentative but still reassuring, a confirmation of things they already suspected. The soft, almost uncertain, sound that Clarke makes gentles him immediately. His fingers relax against her jaw and his lips soften.

In the end, he never _wants_ to hurt Clarke Griffin.

After an excruciating moment, her hands clutch at his jacket as she lets herself melt against him and Bellamy loses track of time. The only reason he pulls away is to drag air into his traitorous lungs. Gently, he leans his forehead against Clarke's, unwilling to leave her warmth.

“I promise this isn't why I came after you," she breathes out shakily, refusing to meet his eye again.

_I wouldn't have minded if it were,_ he thinks, staring at her bee-stung lips.  

Unless Clarke’s developed the ability to read minds, he must blurt that out loud because she startles and jerks her head back. After a moment of searching, the look she gives him is all faith and hope and future. 

"Yeah?" 

There's something broken in her voice, unsure and lost, and Bellamy hates it. He cups her cheek as gently as he can and nods. Her eyes flutter closed and she leans into his palm. 

"I'm sorry," she murmurs.

Honestly, Bellamy doesn't really want to hear it. It feels like all they've done recently is apologize to each other. He tries to protest, but she shakes her head.

"No, you deserve an apology. It felt like as soon as I was involved in anything again, everything started going downhill. Pike and Ontari and Emerson."

"None of that was your fault, Clarke."

She shrugs, like she doesn't really believe him but quirks a sardonic smile. "It's my burden to always feel overly responsible."

He huffs out a dry laugh and Clarke looks so pleased with herself he lets the grin linger. Before he knows it, she's on her toes and pressing her lips to his again. This time, it's positively chaste, an acknowledgement that kissing is something they can do now.

"We should probably talk about this," he offers. Kissing Clarke doesn't magically cure all of their problems, much as he wishes it did. Clarke nods seriously and looks ready to discuss the development now, but Bellamy yawns in her face.

"Yeah, this can probably wait," she teases, which. Has Clarke Griffin ever actually teased him before? If not, he's looking forward to more light, happy Clarke. "Let's sleep on it."

Turning to head back into the grounded hull of the Ark, she reaches for his hand. When he doesn't take it right away, something in his face must give away his hesitance because Clarke's eyes narrow as she sweeps her gaze over him.

"Why are you out here, Bellamy?"

"Am I so forgettable?" he hedges, laying on the charm. 

If anything, Clarke's eyes narrow further. "You didn't come looking for me. You were surprised to find me at Raven's Gate. You're not on duty. Why aren't you asleep?"

Clarke Griffin has always been too astute for her own good. It's part of what made her such a pain in the ass at the dropship. Her unflinching stare and his exhaustion batter at his last reserves of willpower and Bellamy finds himself admitting he's not sleeping well. A few more pointed questions and her thumb rubbing soothingly over his wrist, and he tells her about the unsettling dreams he's had, shuddering at the memory of blood and fire and panic.

"Come on," Clarke tugs him back towards the Ark. "What happened to slaying your demons?"

He flinches. He didn't need that reminder and Clarke's guilty frown reminds him that she didn't either. Someday, they'll be able to talk to each other without tearing open healing wounds. Still, her thumb maintains its caressing path at his wrist and she presses into his side for comfort.

"Hard when you're your demon," he mutters under his breath. And it's true. With all the terrifying things they've seen on the ground, his own actions have felt the worst. 

Bellamy's pretty sure Clarke hadn't heard when they make the rest of the journey to his quarters in silence. But then, they linger at his door and she blurts out, “It’s hard.” 

“What?” he asks warily.

“Becoming a person again." He sighs. Of course she heard. Before he can try to explain himself, Clarke continues, "But it’s worth it."

"You think so?"

Her reply is an instant, firm, "I know so."

The breath he exhales is shakier than he'd like, but Clarke is looking at him so surely that he can't bring himself to care. "All right. Then I guess I'll work on it in the morning."

"We will," she corrects fiercely. "You're not alone, Bellamy. Not unless you want to be."

"Together we survive." And its true. They're not at their best when they're separate. It's nice to know that Clarke is on his side again.

"But for now, you need to sleep." She pushes him towards the door and presses a dry kiss to his cheek, hand over his heart. 

It's nothing like the last time she kissed his cheek, though he can't help but compare. Even as he falls into bed, the warmth that suffused his chest doesn't dissipate, nothing like the numb chill that hovered for all those months Clarke was gone. It's nice, though he has to remind himself its real.

When he wakes up, regardless of the dreams he has, he'll be able to go to Clarke rather than orbiting around her. There's so much to still work out, but they will, together.

For the first time in weeks, Bellamy Blake falls asleep and isn't plagued by nightmares. Instead of dreaming of the past, his mind grants him rest and paints him a radiant future. 

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Spring Fling to officalchacha15! I hoped you liked it, sorry it got so angsty. Well, as angsty as I'm capable.
> 
> For everyone else, happy Spring Fling, too, I guess. I would love to hear any thoughts/comments/criticisms here


End file.
